The National Association of Women Lawyers (NAWL)® is a national voluntary legal professional organization whose mission is the advancement of women in the legal profession and women’s rights. Since 1899, NAWL has served as an educational forum and active voice for the concerns of women lawyers in this country and abroad. NAWL continues to support and advance the interests of women in and under the law, and in so doing, supports and advances the social, political, and professional empowerment of women. Through its programs and networks, NAWL provides the tools for women in the profession to advance, prosper and enrich the profession. NAWL has established the annual Selma Moidel Smith Law Student Writing Competition to encourage and reward original law student writing on issues concerning women and the law. The rules for the competition are as follows:
Entrants should submit a paper on an issue concerning women’s rights or the status of women in the law. The most recent winning paper was “Prosecutorial Indiscretion: District Attorneys’ Misuse of Alabama’s Chemical Endangerment Law to Criminalize Pregnant Women’s Substance Abuse” written by Amy Kokot, Catholic University of America, Columbus School of Law. Please view paper at www.nawl.org.
Essays will be accepted from students enrolled at any law school during the 2013-14 school year. The essays must be the law student author’s own work and must not have been submitted for publication elsewhere. Papers written by students for coursework or independent study during the Summer, Fall or Spring semesters are eligible for submission. Notwithstanding the foregoing, students may incorporate professorial feedback as part of a course requirement or supervised writing project.
FORMAT: Essays must be double-spaced in 12-point, Times New Roman font. All margins must be at least one inch. Entries must not exceed fifteen (15) pages of text, excluding notes, with footnotes placed as endnotes. Citation style should conform to The Bluebook – A Uniform System of Citation. Essays longer than 15 pages of text, excluding notes, or which are not in the required format may not be read.
JUDGING: NAWL designees will judge the competition. Essays will be judged based upon content, exhaustiveness of research, originality, writing style, and timeliness.
QUESTIONS:Questions regarding this competition should be addressed to the chair of the Writing Competition, Professor Jennifer Martin at jmartin@stu.edu.
SUBMISSION AND DEADLINE: Entries must be received by May 1, 2014. Entries received after the deadline will be considered only at the discretion of NAWL. Entries must provide a cover letter providing the title of your essay, school affiliation, email address, phone number and mailing address. Entries must be submitted in the following format: email an electronic version (in Microsoft Word or PDF format) to jmartin@stu.edu.
AWARD: The author of the winning essay will receive a cash prize of $500. NAWL will
also publish the winning essay in NAWL’s Women Lawyers Journal in Fall 2014.